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4/5/18

If you use Google or Facebook, you may have wondered just how much of your personal data these
big internet giants have access to. This is a good question to ask in
our modern era of Big Data, constant connectivity and rapidly decreasing
personal privacy. Some people, like Washington State Chief Privacy
Officer Alex Alben, even argue that your personal data isn’t really “personal” at all.
In other words, you may have unwittingly agreed to give your deepest
information to third-party vendors through websites and apps simply by
agreeing to their lengthy and frequently skimmed Terms of Service.

By the looks of it, Google seems to have some of the most invasive
amounts of data on its users. This isn’t to say the company is using
personal data on people for malicious and nefarious purposes. But the
frequency, detail and amount it has amassed over the years are beginning
to put people on edge.
Let’s start off with location. If you have Google maps enabled (like
many of us), your physical movements and the time you take to get from
Point A to Point B, wherever that may be, has been logged into its
search database. If you want to see proof of this activity, look at your Google timeline.

Then there’s your search history.
Google maintains a database of your search entries as a way to learn
more about you and your preferences. But if you fear that this constant
logging of your personal search history is a dash too deep for your
taste, you need to delete your search history from all the devices you
own. That’s not all. Ads, too, factor into Google’s profiles of its
users. To give you an example, Google has an advertisement profile on me;
its algorithm asserts that I'm a female between the age of 25-34 and
that I might like computers, hair care and politics. Google presents ads
based on the personal information you give the website, including your
age, gender, location, and other metrics. Plus, Google stores your
YouTube search history and maintains a log of information on the apps
you use. From the amount you spend on these apps to the people you talk
to, Google stores that information in its database.

Then there’s Facebook. Amid the Cambridge Analytica scandal,
the social network giant is under massive fire from observers who say
its practices on privacy are reprehensible. With many people joining the
#DeleteFacebook sentiment, the company recently shared an update
in its security settings, saying that access to it would be more
readily available for users. But if you’re interested in knowing just
how much Facebook has on you in terms of personal data, check out its
download feature. Go to your general account settings and look for
“Download a copy of your Facebook data” at the bottom of the options.

It
might be slightly jarring to see just how much Facebook logs about its
users. From personal conversations, phone numbers, apps, photos, videos,
events, locations, and a whole lot more, Facebook’s data can be
converted into tons of documents on individual users. I’ll give you my
example. Since 2008, Facebook has 430.1 megabytes of personal data on
me. To make sense of such a colossal amount, conversion to a Word
document helps. Since one megabyte is almost 500 character-filled pages,
that's about 215,050 pages of text on yours truly. To make matters less
uncomfortable, that’s several novels.

While
Facebook tries to figure out how to respond to growing concern over its
privacy settings, you can do your (small) part in tightening your
profile. You can opt out of Facebook’s API sharing feature so that third-party websites, games and applications don’t have access to your data.